Cabinet approves stipend limits to most yeshiva students

Kadima: Decision is a spit in the face of the youth who 'contribute and serve;' Labor party minister slams Lieberman for supporting move.

Yeshiva 311.
(photo credit:Courtesy)

The government on Sunday voted to limit to five the number of years certain
kollel students will be able to receive a monthly living stipend from the state,
while a select few – some 2,000 characterized as “perpetual students” – will be
eligible for the allotments in perpetuity.

The measure passed the cabinet
by a vote of 14-8, with Likud ministers Gideon Erdan, Limor Livnat and Gideon
Sa’ar joining the five Labor ministers voting against.

Shas head Eli Yishai was not at the meeting because he was
attending the funeral of firefighter Danny Hayat, and the party’s other minister
– Ariel Attias – did not show up for the vote.

The Prime Minister’s
Office issued a statement saying that the resolution that passed was in stark
contrast to the situation today, where kollel students can receive the stipend
for years on end.

Around 11,000 kollel students currently receive these
income supplements.

The move follows a High Court of Justice decision in
June ruling that the government could not continue paying stipends solely to
haredim who study full-time, while others – such as university students – are
ineligible for similar stipends.

In an apparent effort to accommodate the
High Court ruling, the cabinet allocated NIS 50 million to a special fund for
needy students.

According to the statement, “The goal of the
recommendations, which were formulated by an interministerial team chaired by
Prime Minister’s Office director-general Eyal Gabai, is to encourage the
integration of the haredi sector in the labor market and to assist student
populations in a balanced and equal manner.”

Under the plan, kollel
students under the age of 29 with three children, whose income doesn’t exceed
NIS 1,200 and who do not own a car, will receive a stipend of NIS 1,040 a month
for four years. In the fifth year – the so-called “integration” year – the
student will receive 75 percent of that amount and be allowed to study
half-time, and work half-time. After that, he will be expected to enter the
workforce.

Another NIS 20m. will be set aside for some 2,000 yeshiva
students – expected to be the most astute at their studies – who will be allowed
to continue studying past the fiveyear period.

Prime Minister Binyamin
Netanyahu said during the meeting that “these are the first steps that any
government has taken on the issue.

Many governments have talked about it
– we are doing something. This is an unprecedented, substantive and genuine
change of direction. Limiting the support payments is designed to encourage this
population to integrate into the labor market and leave the cycle of
poverty.”

Before the cabinet meeting, Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz
told reporters that while not perfect, the move would be a marked improvement
over the current situation.

“Before, this population could have received
the stipend forever,” Steinitz said, referring to the kollel
students.

“If you limit the stipend to four full years, and partly for a
fifth year, and after five years, like a student after a bachelor’s and master’s
degrees, they will have to think of work and getting professional training, then
that is an improvement over the previous situation.”

Vice Prime Minister
Silvan Shalom (Likud) said during the cabinet meeting that the argument over the
issue has been blown out of proportion and turned into a political battle.
Shalom said it would have been better had the vote been postponed until after
the approval of the 2011/2012 state budget so that the two issues would not be
connected.

Welfare and Social Affairs Minister Isaac Herzog (Labor), who
is currently abroad, left a vote against the resolution and issued a statement
slamming Israel Beiteinu and its chairman Avigdor Lieberman for supporting the
move.

“Lieberman fought like a lion for the conversion bill in its
preliminary reading, but fell like a fly on this arrangement for kollel
students,” Herzog said, referring to last week’s bruising battle over the
conversion bill.

“Lieberman and his party proved with their vote today
that they are strong when it comes to populism, but that they disappear when it
comes to true social and just change.”

During the debate before the vote,
Industry, Trade and Labor Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer (Labor) reportedly
shouted, “I have a 27-year-old grandson, who is a student and also does reserve
duty and also works in security. What answer can I give him after a decision
like this?” Kadima MK Yoel Hasson slammed the move, as did his
party.

“This is another Netanyahu exercise that shows contempt for a High
Court decision and brings humiliation to the court,” Hasson said. “Netanyahu is
lying to students and to IDF soldiers, and bought the support of the haredim
with stipends, paid for by the entire public.”

Kadima issued a statement
saying that Netanyahu “sold out the Israeli public, is training the
draft-dodgers and has turned the IDF from a peoples’ army into the ‘IDF Inc.’”
To win the religious parties’ support for the budget, the statement continued,
“Netanyahu has chosen the culture of lies at the expense of equality, compelling
the public to pay for the cost of his government’s survival.”

The Kadima
statement said the decision “evades responsibility, sells out the values of the
state and spits in the face of the young generation that serves and contributes
to the state.”

MK Zevulun Orlev (Habayit Hayehudi) complained that the
proposal was “extremely unethical and gives a stamp of kashrut to haredi draft
evasion.

“This proposal, which makes the lack in equality of burden more
permanent, could cause evasion from military service among all of those who are
required to enlist,” Orlev said. “It constitutes a danger to national security.
That is why I have requested a hearing in my faction to decide to officially
oppose the decision.”

Some of the most bitter opposition to the
government’s decision was among the nation’s university students, who had
opposed continuing subsidies to kollel students while university students did
not receive such stipends.

“The students have yet to say their last word,
and we are looking into different strategies for continuing [the protest],
including legal action,” National Student Union chairman Itzik Shmueli
said.

Students’ representatives did not rule out renewing mass
protests.

The Movement for Progressive (Reform) Judaism, the Masorti
(Conservative) Movement and Hiddush – For Religious Freedom and Equality – all
organizations that support religious pluralism in Israel – blasted the
decision.

“The government has missed a historic opportunity to fix an
error that threatens the future of Israeli society, and chose to ignore the
clear position of most of the Israeli public, which is fed up with haredi
evasion of both military service and employment,” Rabbi Gilad Kariv of the
Reform Movement said.

“One can only hope that the Israeli public will not
remain apathetic in light of the dishonesty inherent in the government decision,
and will prevent, through its protest, continuing the existing
situation.”